When hunting out of a layout blind I can't see that it makes much difference if my dog (black lab) is in a blind or just laying beside me. She is steady to shot and lays very still when birds are working. I would rather not have to mess with a dog blind but am I losing birds because I'm too lazy to put up another blind?

I personally don't feel it bothers birds at all if the dog is quite still. My first two labs sat right outside my shore blind, under the muzzel blast, up until my hunting buddy got him a dog and his wouldn't sit still, so that's when mine had to come inside the blind...to keep his from sneaking out. I never had a bird flare from either of my girls sitting out front. Found out though, that getting out from underneath the muzzel blast kept the rest of my labs from going deaf at early age.

There could possibly be a problem if the black lab is a big contrast to the ground cover, like wheat, etc. My new lab now will allow me to cover her up with stubble as she lays down and will stay. Have to re-cover every so often as the stubble tends to slide off her slick hair. You might want to try that in a training session with a piece of burlap painted the color of the field or with stubble attached. Your lab will probably accept that a lot easier than you might think.

Anything reminding birds of the last however-many places that erupted in gunfire can put them off, and dogs would certainly be one such common denominator. The more readily apparent, through movement or contrast, the dog, the more ducks are apt to avoid it. I'm fortunate that my breed of choice comes in relatively neutral colors:

But I'm still pretty quick to add natural cover of more appropriate color when applicable:

That, or work the dog from a remote "station" in extreme cases.

And when my morning blind was a rice field pit guest dogs of strong color contrast sometimes hunted, I kept a doggy ghillie blanket made of camo mosquito netting with z-tied hanks of raffia handy for them.

tenfingergrip wrote:I personally don't feel it bothers birds at all if the dog is quite still. My first two labs sat right outside my shore blind, under the muzzel blast, up until my hunting buddy got him a dog and his wouldn't sit still, so that's when mine had to come inside the blind...to keep his from sneaking out. I never had a bird flare from either of my girls sitting out front. Found out though, that getting out from underneath the muzzel blast kept the rest of my labs from going deaf at early age.

There could possibly be a problem if the black lab is a big contrast to the ground cover, like wheat, etc. My new lab now will allow me to cover her up with stubble as she lays down and will stay. Have to re-cover every so often as the stubble tends to slide off her slick hair. You might want to try that in a training session with a piece of burlap painted the color of the field or with stubble attached. Your lab will probably accept that a lot easier than you might think.

I'd like to see somebody come out with a mesh type camo dog vest. The neoprenes are great when the weather gets cold but early season a strong mesh type vest would probably sell pretty well.

I've also considered a "magnum" shell decoy with 4 legs on it for the dog to hide under.

There could possibly be a problem if the black lab is a big contrast to the ground cover, like wheat, etc. My new lab now will allow me to cover her up with stubble as she lays down and will stay. Have to re-cover every so often as the stubble tends to slide off her slick hair. You might want to try that in a training session with a piece of burlap painted the color of the field or with stubble attached. Your lab will probably accept that a lot easier than you might think.

dakotashooter says,"I'd like to see somebody come out with a mesh type camo dog vest. The neoprenes are great when the weather gets cold but early season a strong mesh type vest would probably sell pretty well."

Thanks, dakotashooter, you just got my fertile mind in gear for me....good idea! I've got lots of scrap fishing net that I have used to make portable duck/goose blinds with hanks of rafia looped on it. I've also got a vest from my retired lab that's not being used. I'm gonna marry the two, the vest and fish net, with a needle and thread, and loop some appropriately colored rafia to have a camo'd dog vest for my one year old lab. Leaving for Canada Tuesday week for a month and maybe I can get one together before then.

some of those ideas seem like more of a hassle then setting up a dog blind. If I'm in my layout blind, he's in his. Which usually means were in a low cover area or field. If not, I just find a comfortable place in the shadows/cover for him to be. My dog's blind folds up and fits inside of my blind, so it's no extra work bringing it, and it takes all of 2 minutes to set it up.

Just for the sake of pot stirring.. How could someone know whether or not a dog sitting outside a blind has never flared a bird? Unless a bird has never flared the dog in questions' spread. Surely that can't be the case. Obviously you could conclude that it won't prevent some or maybe even a lot of ducks from coming in, but I bet the smart ones might notice the large unusual black blob sitting there.

I 100% believe people have ducks come in when the dog is sitting out in the open, but I've also had ducks come in when I was in the water picking up decoys, but most people probably wouldn't recommend standing there often.

Never had a dog in a blind while hunting and I've never had a bird flare while hunting over them. There is a big difference between flaring and not committing. If the dog is still i've never seen a negative reaction from birds.

You've never had One bird flare? You must be from up North where are all the ducks are dumb. Just kidding!

Maybe I'm just misinterpreting "flaring" or we see it different ways.

I think of flaring as: a duck breaks off the flock or from his current objective and begins to work the spread. He then gives me a big webbed middle finger and leaves. Could have been for a number of reasons, including a dog out of a blind or that my buddy is standing taking a pee. Since the bird never really cupped or made a landing attempt, I guess that could be defined as just not committing. But I just call it flaring.

If that scenario is referred to as not committing, I would assume flaring would have to be a duck dead set on coming into your spread that suddenly bails out.

What would you call a duck that you called at that showed no interest in your spread or calling? Not interested? Anti social?

Rtyler4616 wrote:You've never had One bird flare? You must be from up North where are all the ducks are dumb. Just kidding!

Maybe I'm just misinterpreting "flaring" or we see it different ways.

I think of flaring as: a duck breaks off the flock or from his current objective and begins to work the spread. He then gives me a big webbed middle finger and leaves. Could have been for a number of reasons, including a dog out of a blind or that my buddy is standing taking a pee. Since the bird never really cupped or made a landing attempt, I guess that could be defined as just not committing. But I just call it flaring.

If that scenario is referred to as not committing, I would assume flaring would have to be a duck dead set on coming into your spread that suddenly bails out.

What would you call a duck that you called at that showed no interest in your spread or calling? Not interested? Anti social?

On a side not: I've seen ducks "flare" from a group of live ducks.

I guess it's all opinion. I consider it flaring when the duck is committed and wanting in, then it sees someone move, dog move, etc. and just hauls ass out. Know what I mean? Circling and not committing I blame on the spread setup or just not where they want to be but came to just check it out. But you can tell just by their actions when you've been spotted!

Sorry if I was unclear to begin with, and I've had birds flare from movement and such, rare but happens, but I've never thought it to be the dog as someone always claims it was them that flared the bird. Who knows, coulda been the dog, guess it would be hard to know 100% without talking to the duck.

In my situation, I've never had a problem with dogs out of the blind as he is never in it. When we hunt public WMAs and land, it just sits next to a bush or whatever.

And on another note, for the "must live up north and have dumb birds" comment, you are probably right. I live in NNY and we are pretty much the first encounter for the birds, I'm sure cover is much more important the further south you go.

Like I said earlier, just stirring the pot. I don't have much of an opinion on whether a dog out of the blind flares birds or not. Just saying that no one could REALLY know 100% whether they do or not.

I like them to have there own Blind. On the down side the dog is so happy all ya here is the "Thump Thump Thump " of her tail in there. I thought a pc of foam would help but she hits the side of the blind. I know its ok but after a while it sound like one of those cars with Crap music on shaking the sh.. out of you.